amen and amen
without holiness we cannot enter into heaven.........
Hebrews 12
dont be decieved manyteach a gospel that says holiness is not necessary
Hello Traveling teacher, welcome to CF,
The starting point and assumption of this thread is,
that holiness is necessary. The point we are aiming at for is,
what is holiness.
The scripture that W2L points us to tells us that holiness involves separation and cleanliness. Ok, but as I've said to him, what does that mean in practice, in day to day living? Do you advocate monasticism as a way to holiness? How do we, “cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit”?
Hebrew (Strong's dictionary):
H6944 קֹדֶשׁ qôdesh (ko'-desh): From H6942; a sacred place or thing; rarely abstractly sanctity
H6942 קָדַשׁ qâdash (kaw-dash'): A primitive root; to be (causatively make, pronounce or observe as) clean (ceremonially or morally)
So the idea behind holy in Hebrew is cleanness (morally or ceremonially).
Greek (Strong's dictionary):
G40 ἅγιος hagios (hag'-ee-os): From ἅγος hagos (an awful thing) compare G53, [H2282]; sacred (physically pure, morally blameless or religious, ceremonially consecrated)
G53 ἁγνός hagnos (hag-nos'): From the same as G40; properly clean, that is, (figuratively) innocent, modest, perfect
Also in the Greek we see the connotation of purity/cleanness.
Holy items in the temple were "set apart" as holy, in order to keep them ceremonially clean. In the same way, if we wish to be clean, we must be set apart to God in a world that will desecrate us morally.
Hope this helps;
Mike
Yes Mike, helpful,
Interesting that the root word hagos has the meaning of an
awe-full thing.
I'm not sure that saying “agape is holiness” really clarifies holiness or that 'doing agape' leads to holiness? Maybe it's the other way round?
fhansen seems to be making the same point so I'll take this further in my reply to him.
This is the oft-quoted definition of holiness: the state of being without sin.
Yet, that makes the definition of God's central character dependent on that which He is NOT.
Let me phrase it this way:
God was who He is, long before sin existed.
God was Holy, from eternity past.
Long before sin came along.
How could holiness have been defined back then, without referring to sin?
Hi Polyjetix, yes agreed but in
our attempts to 'achieve' holiness sin will inevitably be in the the picture.
It means having to be aware of what I think, say, look at and how I behave.
Needless to say I fail at it constantly.
Yes John agreed, awareness and self examination, which supposes some measure of spiritual discernment, have to be part of 'perfecting holiness'.
I hope your constancy in failing starts to diminishes. Could get a bit depressing otherwise
.
The definition of holiness, righteousness, justice, is love, the very nature of God that we're to be transformed into. And this is why the Greatest Commandments are what they are.
One way that holiness is commonly described is by using the concept of sinlessness. But sinlessness is just the flip side, or the negative way of describing, the state of one who loves. Because 'love fulfills the Law' (Rom 13:8), it produces sinlessness/ overcomes lawlessness by its nature. Love is the means by which God places His law in our minds and writes it on our hearts, fulfilling the New Covenant prophecy of Jer 31:33-34.
But it doesn't stop with simply opposing sin, from refraining from harming our neighbors, but also with producing positive acts that seek to aid our neighbor when they need help, to make a better world, to strive for God's will to be done on earth.
Love is the heart of justice for man; it's what faith is meant to lead to. This happens because faith is a turning to God, constituting the doorway to relationship or communion with Him, 'apart from Whom we can do nothing' (John 15:5) but 'with Whom all things are possible' (Matt 19:26), so that He may indwell and do His work in us. Only love can overcome the evil in this world-while providing the pathway to God's kingdom for us.
Hello flansen,
As with food4thought, who seems to be making this same point that love=holiness, I question how helpful this is? Holiness-righteousness-justice-agape love are not synonyms. Yes closely connected but each has its own meaning. I think that being able to grasp the distinctiveness of each, rather than blurring them together, will help us the better to 'do' them.
Indeed, 1 Peter 1:13-16 was referencing Leviticus for instructions for how to have a holy conduct as God is holy. It is also pretty straightforward that observing God's holy days is part of what means to have a holy conduct. Holiness is about being set apart for a specific purpose. For example, vessels in the temple that were holy were used only for one specific purpose and were not used for any other purpose. God is holy because He is set apart for the redemption, reconciliation, and restoration of man-kind and God has made us holy by making us new creations for the purpose of living for the one who died for us and was raised again and by giving us the privilege of being Christ's ambassadors and joining in God's ministry of reconciliation (2 Corinthians 5:11-21). As members of God's chosen people, we are set apart to be a light to the world to show them how to become reconciled to God, how to serve Him, and how to walk in His ways.
Hello Soyeong, thanks for your input,
Yes Peter points to Leviticus
yet that scripture is specifically about
showing holiness by keeping strict rules about what to eat and what not to eat. But when we put that together with Acts 10, John 15:10-20 and Romans 14 we know that
now (at least for non jewish Christians)
showing holiness is not done through those rules.
So then the pertinent question is,
how now do we show holiness? By keeping the seventh day distinct and special? I
don't want to be diverted into that specific topic
but I would be interested to hear what sort of 'life style' choices are there that a Christian might adopt to
show holiness.
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